Chapter 1

I am Liam Hayes's human diffuser.

That is my identity. My only purpose. He stripped everything else away. I was once Ava Monroe, a perfumer with a future. Now, I am just a vessel, a walking scent he owns.

He was with Chloe Thompson tonight. I watched them from the top of the grand staircase, hidden in the shadows where he told me to wait. He held her close, his hand resting on the small of her back. Chloe leaned her head on his shoulder, looking up at him with wide, innocent eyes. She was the picture of delicate beauty.

No one would guess the poison that lived inside her.

Liam laughed at something she said, a deep, genuine sound that I hadn't heard directed at me in years. It echoed in the cavernous hall, a painful reminder of what I could never have. He looked happy. He looked free. My presence was a chain, and he wore it only when he wanted to feel its weight.

A sharp pain shot through my abdomen, a familiar cramp that signaled the beginning of the end. I pressed a hand against my stomach, my breath catching in my throat. It was too soon. The baby, our seventh, was only three months along. But I knew the signs. The dull ache that had been my companion for days was sharpening into a blade.

I had to endure it. For him. Liam had made a promise. If I could carry a child to term, just one, he would let me go. He would release my family's company from his grip. It was a lie, I knew it was a lie, but it was the only thing I had to hold on to. Hope was a poison, too, but I drank it willingly every day.

The pain intensified, a hot, coiling serpent in my womb. I bit my lip to keep from crying out, the metallic taste of blood filling my mouth. I couldn't show weakness. Not here. Not when he was watching.

He looked up then, his eyes finding mine in the darkness. The smile vanished from his face, replaced by a cold, hard mask. He said something to Chloe, his voice too low for me to hear, and then he started towards the stairs.

Each step he took was a hammer blow against my fragile control. He stopped in front of me, his tall frame blocking out the light from the party below. The air grew thick with his expensive cologne, a scent designed to project power and control. It choked me.

"What is it?" he asked, his voice flat.

"It's starting," I whispered, the words barely audible. I couldn't look at him. I stared at the polished marble floor instead.

"Again?" The single word was laced with disappointment and disgust. Not for the child we were losing, but for my failure. My body's failure to produce what he wanted.

He grabbed my arm, his fingers digging into my flesh. "You are useless, Ava."

He dragged me up the stairs and into our bedroom suite. The room was beautiful, all white and gold, but to me, it was a prison. He threw me onto the bed, the impact jarring my already aching body.

"I gave you one job," he snarled, pacing in front of the bed like a caged animal. "One simple thing. And you can't even do that."

I curled into a ball, wrapping my arms around my stomach as another wave of pain washed over me. "I'm sorry," I sobbed. "Liam, I'm so sorry."

He stopped pacing and turned to me. His face was a mask of fury. "Sorry doesn't fix this. Do you know what your parents did to my mother? Do you have any idea the hell she went through because of their ambition?"

He knelt by the bed, his face close to mine. His eyes, usually a cold, distant gray, burned with a fire I knew all too well. It was the fire of pure, unadulterated hatred. A hatred that had been simmering for over a decade.

"Your family's precious formula," he spat the words. "The one that was supposed to enhance human connection. It destroyed her. It made her a joke, a pariah. They watched her die, Ava. They did nothing."

"That's not true," I cried. "They didn't know-"

"They knew," he interrupted, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "And you will pay for their sins. You, your body, your scent. You are the legacy of their failure, and I will own you until there is nothing left."

He stood up, his face once again a cold, indifferent mask. "The doctor will be here in an hour to collect the...placenta. Chloe needs it. Her health is fragile."

He turned and walked out of the room, leaving me alone with my pain and the ghost of another lost child. For three years, this had been my life. A cycle of forced pregnancy, loss, and torment. Each time a child was conceived, my body would produce the rare, potent ingredients of my family's formula in a highly concentrated form. And each time I lost the child, that precious "essence" was harvested and given to Chloe, a booster for her supposedly weak constitution.

This time, the seventh time, something inside me broke. The last thread of hope snapped. I lay on the bed, bleeding and empty, and I knew I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't be his diffuser, his broodmare, his symbol of revenge.

When the pain finally subsided into a dull, throbbing emptiness, I got up. My legs were weak, but I forced myself to walk. I found the small, velvet-lined box where I kept the ashes of my last child, the only one I had managed to carry long enough to be cremated. I clutched the box to my chest.

I walked out of the room, down the stairs, and past the lingering party guests. No one stopped me. I was invisible, a ghost in my own home. I walked out the front door and into the street. The roar of traffic was a symphony of escape.

I saw the headlights of a truck approaching. This was it. This was my release. I took a step off the curb, clutching the small box to my heart.

Suddenly, strong arms wrapped around me, pulling me back from the edge with brutal force. I fell to the pavement, the box of ashes scattering across the asphalt.

Liam stood over me, his chest heaving. In his hand was a torn piece of paper. It was my family's formula, the very thing he had used to destroy me. He had ripped it in two. His face was a twisted canvas of rage and something else, something that looked terrifyingly like fear.

"What do you think you're doing?" he screamed, his voice raw with an emotion I couldn't name. He grabbed my shoulders and shook me. "You don't get to escape, Ava! You don't get to die!"

His words were meant to be cruel, a promise of more suffering. But as he held me there, amidst the scattered ashes of our child, I saw a tear trace a path down his cheek. It was a single, solitary tear, but it was enough to shatter my world all over again.